For gestational diabetes, calcium and vitamin D might help

Gestational diabetes (GDM), which affects about 7 percent of all pregnancies in the U.S., might be helped by a joint supplementation of calcium and vitamin D, according to research from the Isfahan University of Medical Sciences in Iran..

In addition to increased risk for pre-eclampsia (when a pregnant women experiences high blood pressure and protein in the urine), pre-term delivery and the need for caesarean delivery, gestational diabetes may also raise risk for early heart disease.

Supplementation helps insulin sensitivity, improves good cholesterol

The study included 56 women with gestational diabetes who either received calcium plus vitamin D supplements or a placebo. Women who received supplements took 1,000 mg of calcium per day and 50,000 IU of vitamin D3 tablets twice daily.

Those taking the calcium and D had significant improvements in fasting blood glucose, insulin sensitivity and HDL ("good") cholesterol when compared with the women taking placebo pills.

"Calcium plus vitamin D supplementation in GDM women had beneficial effects on metabolic profile," the authors wrote. "This is important because elevated circulating levels of inflammatory markers and impaired insulin metabolism in GDM can predict the progression to type 2 diabetes (T2D) later in life and neonatal complications."

Women with gestational diabetes are also more likely to have babies that are larger at birth, experience birth trauma or have future cardiovascular or metabolic complications.

More information about the study is published in the journal Diabetologia.

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